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A Qualitative Assessment of Butterfly Fauna (Insecta: Lepidoptera) of East Kolkata, West Bengal and a Note on their Conservation Aspect
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Urban morphology of Kolkata has been changed considerably in last three to four decades. This change is more vivid in newly developed zones like East Kolkata and New Town areas. The town planning, buildings and land use tremendously altered the basic characters of the land, water bodies and vegetation. Consequently, the flora and fauna of the area have been adversely affected. In this background an assessment of the richness of the butterfly fauna was undertaken by periodical surveys for 13 months during 2021-2022. Altogether fifty species belonging to five families were recorded and that indicated no major biodiversity loss from a dataset of about twenty five years back. Some species of earlier study were unnoticed, indicating partial loss of habitat condition. As the butterflies are good environmental indicators and benefactors some suggestions are made for their better survival and conservation.
Keywords
Kolkata Metropolitan Area, Urbanisation, Habitat Change, Butterfly, Faunal Status, Conservation Need.
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